Inside William Ruto's-Raila succession plan

President Ruto and Raila Odinga at State House, where he was officially unveiled as Kenya's candidate for the Chairperson of the African Union Commission. [File, PCS]

While Raila Amolo Odinga lived, he kept Luo Nyanza as his political playfield. None of those competing to inherit his political estate has his command. They just invoke his name and hope that Raila’s core constituency, the Luo people that he inherited from Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, would follow them.

Jaramogi, a self-confessed student of Jomo Kenyatta’s school of political opportunism, punctured Tom Mboya’s political balloon in June 1958 at the Legislative Council by declaring that the only leaders that Africans knew were the people languishing in prison.

He thereby nullified the media's effort to portray Mboya as the leader of the Africans. The deflated Mboya bounced back through mass mobilisation mainly in urban areas to be staged on October 20, which later became Kenyatta Day.

The rivalry for African leadership, following Kenyatta’s likely death, became the politics of Kenyatta’s death for roughly 20 years from 1958 to 1978. The intensity of the Jaramogi and Mboya rivalry was premised on the fact that the jailed Kenyatta was ailing and was expected to die. Although Kenyatta did not die in jail, he was still expected to die in the early 1960s, but he refused to cooperate.

As the minister for constitutional affairs during Kenya’s Dominion period of 1964, Mboya shepherded the Republican Constitution to ensure that, should President Kenyatta die, Vice-President Odinga would not automatically become president. 

Since Jaramogi still had some influence as Kanu vice-president, the party vice-presidency was abolished in 1966 through the novelty of creating eight ‘majimbo’ Kanu vice-presidencies. Jaramogi resigned, but Mboya said that he had been pushed out. Pushing Jaramogi out ended the eight-year-old power rivalry between Odinga and Mboya in the politics of Kenyatta’s death.

Two years later, in 1968, the politics of Kenyatta’s death took a different twist. With Jaramogi no longer a political factor, Kanu deviated from its pre-Uhuru stance as  Kenya African Democratic Union (Kadu) officials infiltrated and made Kanu stalwarts expendable. Joseph Murumbi was also booted out and former KADU Chairman Daniel Arap Moi became vice-president.

Cult following

Mboya became irrelevant and when Kenyatta experienced discomfort in 1968, the politics of Kenyatta’s death loomed large and Mboya was the target. Drastic constitutional changes in 1968 required candidates to belong to a party, made the sitting vice-president the acting president for 90 days, and introduced detention without trial. In 1969, after Mboya died, Jaramogi consolidated his Luo base for roughly 25 years.

This was the base that Raila inherited when Jaramogi died in 1994 and for three decades, he reigned supreme. He expanded his control and operating style, thereby creating a cult following beyond the Luo to include Luhya neighbours and coastal activists. He developed the ability to lose elections and gain political power, starting with his ‘koperesen’ deal with President Moi that collapsed when Moi anointed Uhuru in 2002.

It again surfaced in 2008, after he lost narrowly to Mwai Kibaki in 2007, and he became prime minister in the British-demanded power-sharing, or ‘Nusu Mkate’, government. After losing to Uhuru in 2017, he forced Uhuru into a ‘handshake’ in 2018 as a price for ‘peace.’ He again lost to William Ruto in 2022, only for Ruto to make Raila a virtual co-president in dealing with the 2024 Gen Z uprising. When Raila died last year, Ruto gave him a full presidential funeral.

A post-Raila ODM is divided. Edwin Sifuna leads the ‘rethinking’ side while Oburu Odinga champions UDA/ODM collaboration. Sifuna, having rehabilitated Raila from the 2024 perception of betraying the Gen Zs, has a large youthful following. Oburu wants a pre-2027 election Nusu Mkate government deal, only for Ruto to destabilise him.

Ruto ignored perceptions that Luo Nyanza was an ODM zone. In fielding UDA candidates in the presumed Raila-protected zone, Ruto rubbished and confused Oburu. He made the idea of Luo zoning and the Oburu/Wanga ODM faction politically irrelevant.